Bentley is at it again! :3 He doesn't seem too excited about his crate!

Hi, we got the crate simply for sleeping and not for long extended times away. He has a wooden vertical bar exercise pen.

Now I got the crate from pets mart and it is a PetMate Curvations Pet Carrier. and here is the Link

Petmate Curvations Pet Carrier - Carriers - Crates, Carriers & Kennels - PetSmart

...Yes it is pink...it was the only one they had and we needed one.....

My Bentley is 10 pounds, and again he is a Pom-Min as my husband calls him. At length he is about...hm two feet perhaps? At the most two and a half.


Now, we took Bentley to PetsMart to get him his crate, he did GREAT on his first experience with this. Now....my only problem is. I have to take the crate out at night or he will try and chew the side or flip it around.. But if I get him a wire crate, he will climb the crate and jump out of his pen if he is not in there. The crate is in our room and I am mostly always home with the exception of grocery shopping. I got this to train him better to not go potty in the house, and got him a KONG classic, tossed it in there stuffed with peanut butter....

He won't go all the way in now...he will stand there with his butt sticking out licking at the toy. I mean, just give him a bit more time? Toss him in and see what happens? (kidding I'd never do that to my Bentley) Any ideas? His Monk is in there (his blanket) but he just drags it out. I tried putting his favorite pillow in there....that did not really work either.

He has room to stand up, turn and lay down all nice and cuddled up, it isn't meant for anything other than waiting before I take him out again to try and go pee again, and sleepy by time with the door open for now. He liked his other crate...but used that to get out of his pen and almost learned to flip the latch and open it....Geeze that scared me.... But he will try and play with the crate. Any ideas for stopping that...other than stand over him with a squirt gun hidden? (He hates water...and bathes and rain)


Thanks everyone!


Any help would be awesome!

I love my frozen Kong for crating dogs. Giving him the Kong was a good idea. I think adding baked sweet potato and freezing the whole thing would help, and also be more nutritious. It takes time to eat. Throw it all the way in the back and quickly close the door on the crate when Bentley goes in to get it. Keep in mind that if you make a big deal of leaving him, he will too. No long farewells, just a quick "I'll be back" and out the door. Make sure you take him out to potty right before putting him in the crate. A good routine might be to potty, keep him on the leash, grab the Kong & crate. After he gets used to this routine, he may like the Kong enough to go in their easily. You also said that you are home with him most of the time, maybe crating him with his Kong while you drive around the block will be short trips that will help him get used to his crate and the routine.